Light, Life & Love

 

Sutra... 

LIGHT IS  the most mysterious thing in the universe - for many reasons.

You may not have felt it like that, but the first thing about Light is that Light is the purest energy. Physics says that everything material is not really matter. Only energy is real. Matter is dead; matter exists no more. It never existed except in our conceptions. Matter appears to be, but it is not. Only Light is => Or, energy is; electricity is. The deeper we penetrate into matter, the less material is found. At the very deepest there is no matter, and matter itself becomes non-material. But Light remains; Energy is. 

Light is the purest energy. Light is not matter, and wherever we feel matter it is only Light condensed. 

So matter means light condensed. This is the first mystery about Light, because it is the substratum of all Existence. So in a new way, the oldest concept of religions - that in the beginning God said, "Let there be Light," and there was Light - becomes very significant, because Existence in its purity is Light. So if Existence begins, it has to begin with Light. 

Another thing: Light can exist without Life, but Life cannot exist without Light. So Life also becomes secondary. Matter simply disappears. It is not. It is only condensed Light. Then Light can exist without Life. Life is not a necessity for Light to exist, but Life cannot exist without Light. So Life becomes secondary and Light becomes primary. In this context, one thing more: just as Light can exist without Life but Life cannot exist without Light, just the same, Life can exist without Love, but Love cannot exist without Life. So these three 'L's have to be remembered - Light, Life, Love. 

Light is the substratum, the ground, and Love is the peak. Life is only an opportunity for Light to reach Love. Life is just a passage. So if you are only alive, you are just in the passage. Unless you reach Love, you have not reached. Light is the potentiality, Love is the actuality, and Life is only a passage. 

So when it is said that God is Love, this is the Love that is meant. Unless you become Love, you are just in between, you have not reached to the end. Light is the beginning, Love is the end, and Life is just a passage that is between the two. 

So remember this: Light can exist without Life. Matter is just an appearance, a "condensity", an intensity of Light, and Life is a manifestation. That which is hidden in Light is manifested. Life is not an appearance: Life is a manifestation. Matter is just Light condensed. So when Light remains Light and becomes condensed, it is matter. When Light evolves, manifests its potentiality, it becomes Life. If it simply remains Life, then Death is the end. If it evolves more, then it becomes Love - and Love is deathless. You may call it God, you may call it Eternity, you may call it anything. These are basic points. If you remember these points, then we can proceed into the sutra. 

Thirdly, in this whole world everything is relative except Light. Only Light has a constant velocity. That's why physics takes Light as the measurement of Time. Everything is relative; only Light is, in a certain way, absolute. Light travels with a constant velocity. Nothing else is constant. So only Light is absolute. There is no change: the velocity is absolute, the speed is absolute. So Light becomes a mystery. It is not relative to anything, and everything else is relative to Light. So nothing can travel with more speed than Light, because if anything takes the speed just equivalent to Light, it will turn into Light. 

If we can throw a stone with the speed of Light, the stone will become Light. Anything moving with the speed of Light will become Light. So nothing reaches the velocity of Light, and nothing transcends the velocity of Light. The speed of Light is 186,000 miles per second. Anything traveling with that speed will become Light. That's why scientists say we cannot travel with the speed of Light: because anything - we or aircraft, rockets - anything traveling with that speed will become Light itself. 

Fourthly, Light travels without any vehicle; everything else can travel only with a vehicle. Only Light travels without vehicles. That is mysterious. And also, Light travels without any medium. Everything else has to travel through a medium. A fish can travel in water, a man can travel in air, but Light travels in nothing, in nothingness.

But now they have found that there is no medium. The whole universe is just a vast space, and Light travels in nothingness. That means even nothingness cannot destroy it, even emptiness cannot affect it. That means even non-being cannot affect Light's being. And it can travel without any medium, without any vehicle. That means the energy is not derived from somewhere else. Light itself is the energy. If you have some derived energy, then you will have to travel through mediums, through vehicles; you cannot go yourself. Light goes by itself. 

Fifthly, Light is neither being pushed nor being pulled. It simply travels! If I throw a stone, then there is a push. I put my energy in the stone, and the stone will only go to the limit, to the extent, up to where it can be forced by my energy. When my energy fails or is exhausted, the stone will fall down. The stone is not traveling with its own energy. The energy has been given to it, it is foreign. 

Everything in the world has foreign energy in it - except Light. Everything moving is moving with some energy derived from somewhere else. A tree is growing, but the energy has been derived. A flower is flowering, but the energy has been derived. You are breathing and living, but the energy is derived. You have no energy of your own. Nothing has, except Light. 

In this reference, the saying of Mohammed in the Koran becomes very significant. He says, "God is light," and what he means by this is that only God is His own source of energy. Everything else is just derived. 

So we really live a borrowed Life. It is borrowed from many, many sources. That's why our lives are conditional. If one source just refuses to give us energy, we are dead. Light lives with its own energy - unborrowed, self-originating. It is neither pushed nor pulled, and it moves. That's the most mysterious thing possible. It is a miracle! 

Sixthly, if only Light has its own energy and everything else lives with borrowed energy, certainly it must be that everywhere, ultimately, the energy is borrowed from Light - because if everything lives with borrowed energy except Light, then ultimately Light is the donor. Wherever you get your energy, ultimately, the source must be Light.

You are eating food and you are getting energy, but the food itself gets it through Light, through sunrays, so you are not getting it from food. Food does not have its own energy source: food is deriving it from somewhere else. The food is doing only an in-between work, the work of a medium. Because you cannot absorb Light directly, trees are absorbing it, and then they transform it in such a way, they compose it in such a way, that you can take that energy directly. So they work as mediums - then Light becomes the only source of energy. 

So if everything drops in the universe, Light will not be affected. If everything just goes off, if the whole universe is dead, Light will not be affected. The universe will still be filled with Light. But if Light goes off, then everything will die. Nothing can exist. 

This fundamental nature of Light is not only basic for science,
it is basic for religion also.

So now the second part: if you penetrate matter you stumble upon Light. If you penetrate Life you again stumble upon Light. So religious mystics have always said, "We experience Light, we realize Light - the Light within, the flame within." All the mystics have talked this way, and it is not only symbolic. Only within this past century has it become possible to say that it is not only symbolic. If matter dissolves into Light, comes out of Light, why not Life itself? And when a mystic goes deep, he is going deep into Life, he stumbles upon Light. This going deep into oneself means going more and more to the original source of Light. 

So the outer Light is not the only Light. You have inner Light also, because you cannot exist without it. Light is the base. 'To be' means to be grounded in Light; there is no other being. So when you go within you are bound to come to and realize a dimension, a realm, of Light - inner Light. This inner Light and your Life make just two layers. Your Life is the outermost layer; Light is a deeper layer. 

Your Life will end in Death. Unless you realize the inner Light, you cannot know the Deathless, because your Life is just a phenomenon; it is not the base. It is just a phenomenon, a wave - a wave on the ocean of Light. It will go! If you can penetrate through it to the deeper realm of Light, you will know that which is immortal, which cannot die - because only Light cannot die, only Light is immortal. 

Everything will have to die, because everything lives on derived Life, borrowed Life. Only Light has its own Life. Everything else has Life borrowed from somewhere else. So one has to return it, one has to give it back. 

So unless you realize the inner Light, you will not know that which is beyond Death. In a sense it is beyond Death and beyond Life also. Only then does it become immortal. That which is born will have to die; that which is alive will become dead. So only that can be beyond Death which is beyond Life itself. Light is beyond Life and beyond Death. Whenever mystics have been talking about Light, they always talk about Deathlessness, because the moment you enter the inner Light, the source of Life, you enter Deathlessness. 

In this sutra, both terms have been used. This sutra says: 

So unless you are bathed in your own inner Light, and in the nectar, in the immortality which belongs to that Light, you are not ready to enter the Divine temple. This is a preparatory bath. Water will not do: Light has to be used. Pure Light has to be used. Unless you are bathed in pure Light, you are not ready to enter the Divine temple.